Atlanta, GA

Most of my close friends know I’ve always had nightmares. Ever since I was three years old I would wake up remembering all the disturbing images leftover from the subconscious montage the night before. After a while, I started to enjoy most of them for the stories they told and the interesting notion that it took details from my days and wove them together into a David Lynchesque short film. Still, there were times when the nightmares were more like night terrors. For those who never spent their adolescence obsessed over dreams and such, as I did, the difference between the two is that you usually don’t remember your night terrors and you wake up startled, sweating, and at a loss as to what happened, just the feeling like you were violated in some way. They are actually more of a sleeping disorder so I would not say that I ever suffered from official night terrors, but that’s the best way for me to describe them. In college I had a resurgence of the “night terrors,” but this time the worst part was that throughout the following day, I would have sudden flashbacks: images of the dream flickering into my thoughts, progressively getting worse until I could remember a good portion of it and unfailingly wishing I hadn’t. This happened to me today.

So here I shall offer up one of the most disturbing dreams I’ve had in years. It was a two parter. The first night I could only remember bits and pieces and I wasn’t sure I was remembering it correctly, but then this morning I had the sequel, or rather the conclusion, hopefully. If this is a three parter, I don’t think I’m ready for it. Before I begin, I just want to apologize to those making an appearance in the dream. The cast of characters are as follows: some woman who rents out obscure locations,

…and myself of course for I play the appropriate lead character, the first person point of view role.

Nightmare Part 1: As with most dreams, this one dissolved from something absurd, I think involving being chased by a doberman, into this. Christy and I are talking and she says she has a brilliant idea. She says we should invite Kris and Shoshana for dinner, of which I think is a great idea so I say, “of course, but why?” Christy says, “Well, I have this idea. We invite them for dinner. A little veggie stir fry, your specialty, but the surprise will be that they’ll actually be the main ingredient.” I stare at her for a minute, trying to process what she is saying. Somehow she has this idea that it would be clever and ironic to trick them into believing it will be a vegetarian dinner, when in actuality it will have meat in it and that meat will be them. We will murder them. And then we will eat them. She seems so sure of it’s brilliance and foolproofness, that for some reason I begin to nod numbly and agree to invite them. All the while the word CANNIBALISM keeps flashing across the screen of my dream and I can’t stop picturing the chicken like fleshy meat in the stir fry pan. This image stays with me throughout, popping up here and there. The plan is to hold the “dinner party” out in the wilderness off this trail and she promises to set all that up if I just convince them to come. Then I woke up and was unsure as to what I had just dreamt.

Nightmare Part 2: Picking up in real time it seems, it is the next night and Christy asks me if I got a hold of Kris and Shoshana. I say yes and that they are really excited about dinner. She introduces me to this woman who tells us we can have the rental all night and that there are only a few rules. The rules consist of things such as “no pot, no drunk and disorderly behavior, however alcohol is allowed” and I all I kept thinking was, “that’s no problem, we won’t be doing any of that. We’re just going to kill one of my best friends and his girlfriend. No pot, no drunkenness.” But at the same time I knew I didn’t want to do it and I didn’t really believe we were going through with it. Christy and the woman exchange a few more words while I zone out and try to figure out if this is just a dream and how I’m going to manage to wake myself up. Then we head into a supermarket while Christy describes how everything is going to go down. She says that out on this cliff within some trees we’ve rented a kitchen from this woman and all the dishes and food is already up there waiting for us. She says she set it all up yesterday, which begs to wonder whether she did this before or after she talked me into this idea. I tell her that Kris and Shosh are going to meet us up there and they might get there first. I’m starting to worry that they’ll start to figure it out if it doesn’t look like we are going to cook dinner. Christy says, “Well, of course we’re cooking dinner. Everything is ready up there. That’s what this is all about. Dinner.” As we buy some last minute items like garlic and ginger I duck out to make sure Kris and Shosh know where they are going.

Next scene I am standing in front of the path leading up to the dinner spot, talking to Kris. He tells me how excited they are to have dinner with us and how much they are looking forward to my stir fry. As he heads up the hill, I tell him I’ll meet him later after Christy brings the rest of the food, and that’s when I notice the cop car parked right there. Two cops are sitting in the car and one leans out the window to ask me how things are going. I say things are well and they prod a bit more with questions about the “evening’s activities.” I am starting to panic and I am sure they are memorizing my face and comments. I tell them we are having a nice dinner up on the cliff. They tell me to enjoy my evening, but Kris walks back up and begins to chat with them. I had thought he was already gone so I try to hide how startled I am. It turns out Kris is friends with the cops and so while he schmoozes I leave him and head up the hill.

When I get up there, Christy shows up and I drag her into the bathroom. I faintly recall wondering how a bathroom is in the middle of the outdoors. I’m talking full on pristine white bathroom. In a panic, I start grilling Christy on whether we are really going through with this. I think I was taking shots of Jagermeister as I hyperventilated. She tells me to snap out of it and that there is no going back. For some reason I can’t wrap my mind around the idea and I tell her there is no way we can trick them into eating meat. She grabs my face with both her hands and says, “Katie, Jesus Christ, they won’t be EATING the meat. They ARE the meat. We don’t have to trick them into thinking the meat isn’t meat. We just need to put them in the stir fry.”

This is the point where I realize I just can’t go through with it, but I don’t think Christy will let me out of it. Then the bathroom door is suddenly open and a cop is standing there with Kris behind him. The cop asks if everything is alright. He says, “You’re not throwing back a few too many in there are ya?” I wipe some tears off my face as I try to stand up and push on by him. I say, “No, just some personal anguish.” Christy shoots me a look, bats her eyes at the cop, and I glance up at Kris. He is looking at me with concern, but not concern over anything he may have caught on about, but more of a caring thought for me and what might be wrong. I tell him we should go let Shoshana know everything’s fine and I that we should start chopping up the veggies for dinner. He smiles and we walk further up the path. At this point all I can think as I sense Christy wrapping things up with the cop and following us up, is how can we possibly get away with anything now that the cops have seen us and know of our “dinner party” and drama.

I think it was at this point Max woke me up. Like I said, I am hoping this is not a trilogy. I also hope that Christy, Kris, and Shoshana don’t worry about what this dream might be saying. I am not sure where this came from. I also hope that this won’t make them weary of eating my excellent stir fry, because it really is my specialty. And now this makes the following picture all the more disturbing. Quit taunting me with food Christy. 🙂

So as the great Johnny Peel always says, “What do you think, sirs?”